Welcome to another screenside chat. In this chat, I'm going to try to address some of the questions that have come up about learning language. And also, there was a question about the dreamtime, or the dreaming. And I'll start with the dreaming and it, it'll be real quick, because I don't know a lot about it. So, the question was what do I know about the Australian concept of dream time, or the dreaming and is there a similar concept in North America. Well, my very limited knowledge, and I would rely on others who are out there participating from within Australia to help us answer this question. but my understanding is there are tracks across the landscape that can be known through song and there are people who know the songs and the different languages that help you traverse the landscape and these, these song lines that are across the the landscape were left there by, by beings, spare beings that in the time of the creation of the land left the, these marks. And the, the land that came into being through this process of dreaming, and so the, the time of the dreaming is what's represented in these song lines that carry people across the, the whole continent that's a very limited and, and surface kind of understanding of that concept. And so I'd be grateful for people who can Deepen our knowledge and understanding of that and point us to resources for understanding it better. As far as I know, that kind of relationship doesn't exist in North America, although there certainly are cultures and peoples who have songs that are related to place, that are sung in certain times and spaces that connect us to those landscapes and remind. The land that the people are there remind the people of their relationship to those important landscape and, and sacred spaces. So there is that, in terms of trans-versing the continent. I don't know about song lines, but certainly the trade networks were quite extensive and vast. And people knew a lot of different languages prior to European contact, there was certainly a lot of interaction among peoples and some, some sophisticated sign languages. That were developed it, to to enact trade across very different linguistic groups. So that, there was, there was certainly a network of relationships across the land. If they were sung into being I, I'm not aware of that. so I hope that that helps to address that, that really interesting question about the dream time. Now I want to turn attention to those questions that have been emerging about language learning. And so the variations on this are, are what kind of programs are there for learning language? What do the youth think about them? what resources are there? And I think the one of the greatest successful models of language revitalization comes from the Malory and their language nest program. So this was where certain spaces would be places where only the indigenous language was spoken. And it was very important that the, that the whole family was involved. So children would be brought into the language nest, but the parents were having to also learn the language, speak the language, in those spaces, and It's been very successful and attempts have been made certainly to create language nests in other areas. there's one just a, a, a, an hour and a half from Toronto here, in Peterborough that I'm aware of. So this small town or small city has a language nest that's its entirely [UNKNOWN]. There's also been language camps which are kind of language immersion camps where you're learning the language in the setting in which, you know, it made sense to use this language. Where the language Developed the activities that take place while doing the camp are all the kinds of things that the language is about. So, you know its, its kind of strange sometimes to be learning [UNKNOWN] in a classroom with four walls. when the language really is alive on the land in relation to all of the different things that it describes, the processes it describes that are visible in the landscape. So, it's important to get out on the land and learn the language that's describing that, that space. so the camps are a way of doing that and so there's a number of Nishinabe Nwen camps that I'm aware of all across the, the Great Lakes area. So people do sign up for these. How do you maintain that language though? It's really important that it continue to be spoken in the home. I think that's the best case scenario for languages to survive is that they have to be spoken in the home. Learning it at school, I think, is not enough. I think there's you know, there's a, there's a debate about when languages become a subject of instruction and they don't have the same vitality as when they are the medium of instructions. So if you're learning all the things in the language that kind of immersion is, is much more valuable to retaining the language and there's Language revitalization projects all across North America it's a, you know, you can Google stabilizing indigenous languages and you'll get all kinds of resources that are out there that are culturally specific and you can find the the local. language strategies revitalization strategies. If you do that, what are people doing in California, what are they doing in Arizona, what are they doing in the Great Lakes area and, and so forth. You get connected into that the Stabilizing Indigenous Languages conference has been meeting over 20 years. And language teachers and and policy makers have been coming together in these these spaces to talk about what they're doing in their specific locale. And it's getting picked up by others. And being applied with different languages. So, it's very exciting. there's not a lot of funding from the Canadian government supporting languages. And I think this is this is very wrong. Especially, because we had such a sustained multi-generational assault upon indigenous languages through the residential school system. And one way of kind of righting that wrong would be to support the, the vitality of indigenous language instruction for multiple generations going forward. And that would be a way of responding to the injustice of the residential school system. A question about how do the youth respond to these? And it's very very to answer that. Of course, it depends on kind of each young person and there's some places where it just is the language of the community and no one really thinks about it. And there are other places where it's a struggle to take up the languages and learn them. And so it's hard to kind of say, will the youth do it? I think if it's fun and this is not to say that all learning has to be fun all the time, but I mean, if it becomes just something that's enjoyable. And so, I think that's what a lot of the language learners, when they, they bring that spirit of this is, this is, this is, feels good to speak the language. Then that carries in to the youth and how they feel about the language. So, if the, if the elders are speaking it and it feels like a really good, fun thing to do it helps. And there's a group in Toronto called Chimon who's been doing language learning in the community. And they found all kinds of fun strategies to make it to make people who have no understanding of the language come in, and leave knowing some expressions, knowing how to converse. And say a few important things in the language. And they do it through you know, various methods like speed-dating. And it's, and it makes the fun, makes it so that you're, you're enjoying the time with community and with other people. And you leave and you went, hey, I just realized I learned like 50 words tonight. so it's a way of, of introducing people in a way that's not scary, it's not like learning. I think the challenge has been with a lot of the textbook approaches where you have learning conjugation and things like that and repeating things in the way that we learn second or third languages it doesn't always have the same traction. And I think the immersive experience has been the most successful, where people are just immersed, and everyone else around them is speaking it. If you can find communities and places where the language is strong and you spend time there. There's a great book by Roger Spielmann, it's called, You're So Fat. And exploring Ojibwa discourse. And basically, what he did is, he wanted to know more about the Ojibwa language, and he moved to an Ojibwa community and submersed himself and his family in that community for ten to 15 years, something like that. And that's were he picked up his his Ojibwa language use and became, I would say I guess he became fluent. He would probably argue with that, but certainly it's possible. The Truers are another example, Antoine Truer, who didn't speak his language as a young person and is now fluent, and writing about language instruction. and there's great resources by Barb Nolan and [UNKNOWN] wants, Pat [UNKNOWN] wants, and these have been, I've seen these posted in the forums out there too, so there if you're looking for [UNKNOWN] resources, and of course language resources all across the continent are, are there to be found. Google them and you will, you'll find the online learning possibilities are great cause you can actually hear the language being spoken which is an improvement over the books where you just see the phonetic writing of the languages. There's a, there's a whole lot out there and I think it would be great if someone started a thread with the language resources, and you could start posting what do you know, from, from your local situation and maybe even get specific language forms started too. So these are all important things we can do to stabilize and support languages. I thank you for your questions. [UNKNOWN]
